DETROIT – The Red Wings’ up-and-down season continued Wednesday night at Joe Louis Arena against a team they normally handle on home ice.

After back-to-back wins on the road, Detroit came home and was handed a 4-2 setback by the Minnesota Wild.

It’s the first time Detroit has failed to earn at least a point in the last 14 home games against the Wild, going 10-0-3 in the previous 13.

“We spent a lot of the time chasing the game,” Wings coach Mike Babcock said. “But we knew what kind of game it was going to be before we started. We knew they were going to play tight and we knew we had to get through it and get on top of them. It was going to be hard to get to their net, and their specialty teams got two (goals) and we didn’t. I guess we got one there at the end, but we didn’t do much with it early and we weren’t good enough. Any way you want to look at it, we weren’t good enough.”

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Detroit got goals from Gustav Nyquist and Drew Miller. Jimmy Howard made just 15 saves. It’s the most goals he’s allowed since giving up four to Anaheim on Feb. 15.

Devin Setoguchi scored a pair of goals for Minnesota, while Kyle Brodziak and Mikko Koivu also scored. Niklas Backstrom made 36 saves for the Wild, who are is 6-1-0 in their last seven games.

“We take full credit for what happened here and the bottom line is we have to be better than we were,” Babcock said. “Defensively, we have been excellent. Tonight we weren’t and our penalty kill has been just going great, then tonight … you know, that first one was a real gift. They’re going to score power-play goals, but you can’t give them a gift.”

Minnesota was 2-for-3 on power play, while Detroit went 1-for-4.

Despite dominating play in the first period, out-shooting Minnesota 17-5, the Wings left trailing 1-0. Ten of their shots came on two power play chances.

Setoguchi opened the scoring just two minutes into the game after freeing himself from Brendan Smith in the slot. Matt Cullen dug the puck out from behind the net and fed a pass to Setoguchi for the one-timer.

Jordin Tootoo looked like he tied things up four minutes later banging home a loose puck on the goal line, but his goal was disallowed after the referee ruled Drew Miller hit the puck with a high stick. However, on replay it looked as if Dany Heatley batted it out of the air after it hit Miller’s stick which should have nullified the high sticking call.

“They said Millsy high-sticked it,” Babcock said. “Even if Millsy high-sticks it and then hits Heatley’s glove it’s still no goal. So, I mean, I have no issue with that. To me that had nothing to do with the outcome of the game.”

Brodziak made it 2-0 early in the second period as the Wild took advantage of a four-minute high sticking penalty to Niklas Kronwall 30 seconds in. Late in the second of Kronwall’s double minor, Jared Spurgeon zipped by Jonathan Ericsson and fed a pass to Brodziak, who had position on Daniel Cleary, and he beat Howard cleanly.

Nyquist cut Detroit’s deficit in half scoring on a breakaway midway through the game. Nyquist did all the work, chipping the puck away from Spurgeon at the blue line before softly sliding the puck backhand between Backstrom’s pads.

However, less than two minutes later the Wild built their lead back to two after Koivu swung around and shot a puck that glanced off Howard’s glove.

Setoguchi tallied the Wild’s second power play goal of the game by digging out a puck between Smith’s legs after a juicy rebound off Howard’s pads on a shot by Heatley.

Miller added a power play goal for the Wings with 14 seconds left to play.

“We’re not really happy with a lot of things,” Kronwall said. “We have to score on our power play. It’s as simple as that. They won the specialty teams battle and that’s what cost us the game.

“The bounces come when you work hard and that’s something you have to earn,” Kronwall added. “If we would have stuck with it and I don’t think we did that tonight.”

The Wings now embark on a four-game road trip to the West Coast that begins Friday in Anaheim.

“We were a little bit on a roll after those two in western Canada,” Henrik Zetterberg said. “We don’t have that many home games left and we want to make the most of them and unfortunately we weren’t able to do it. We have a long road trip coming up and we just have to start with our first game and then move on to the next one.

“That’s how the schedule is,” Zetterberg continued. “We had some stretches where we were home a lot and we’re paying for that.”

After the loss the Wings are seventh in the Western Conference with 33 points.

“It’s tough not to look (at the standings) because there is so much movement there every day,” Zetterberg said. “If we don’t play a game in two days you’re probably moving down on that list. You have to take advantage of the games you’re playing and get your point, if you don’t the train is leaving.”

Send comments to chuck.pleiness@macombdaily.com and visit his blog at redwingsfront.wordpress.com